Books have always been an important part of my life, but, like most authors, I have a few that changed my life or my creative life in some way. These are the ones that come to my mind as the books that changed my life.
Dracula: I've always loved Dracula and re-read it at least twice a year. There is just something about the dark romance of it that draws me in and I can't escape it...Not that I want to.
Jonathan Harker, incarcerated in a Transylvanian castle, has an alluring but terrifying dream of three women, eager to prey upon him. His host and jailer is none other than Count Dracula, or Nosferatu, the Un-Dead, controller of the wolves.
Jonathan Harker, incarcerated in a Transylvanian castle, has an alluring but terrifying dream of three women, eager to prey upon him. His host and jailer is none other than Count Dracula, or Nosferatu, the Un-Dead, controller of the wolves.
Lolita: Okay, I know this isn't a popular choice, but I have to say that there is something brutally honest about this story. When I was in school, I got caught reading this and was sent to the principal's office. It was my first lesson in prudish censorship and how art isn't always black and white.
Humbert Humbert - scholar, aesthete and romantic - has fallen completely and utterly in love with Lolita Haze, his landlady's gum-snapping, silky skinned twelve-year-old daughter. Reluctantly agreeing to marry Mrs Haze just to be close to Lolita, Humbert suffers greatly in the pursuit of romance; but when Lo herself starts looking for attention elsewhere, he will carry her off on a desperate cross-country misadventure, all in the name of Love. Hilarious, flamboyant, heart-breaking and full of ingenious word play, Lolita is an immaculate, unforgettable masterpiece of obsession, delusion and lust.
Humbert Humbert - scholar, aesthete and romantic - has fallen completely and utterly in love with Lolita Haze, his landlady's gum-snapping, silky skinned twelve-year-old daughter. Reluctantly agreeing to marry Mrs Haze just to be close to Lolita, Humbert suffers greatly in the pursuit of romance; but when Lo herself starts looking for attention elsewhere, he will carry her off on a desperate cross-country misadventure, all in the name of Love. Hilarious, flamboyant, heart-breaking and full of ingenious word play, Lolita is an immaculate, unforgettable masterpiece of obsession, delusion and lust.
Carrie: There isn't a misfit out in the world that at one time or another didn't wish we had the powers described in this book so that we could wreck havoc on the "popular" kids. It was one of those "the author really gets me" moments.
The story of misfit high-school girl, Carrie White, who gradually discovers that she has telekinetic powers. Repressed by a domineering, ultra-religious mother and tormented by her peers at school, her efforts to fit in lead to a dramatic confrontation during the senior prom.
The story of misfit high-school girl, Carrie White, who gradually discovers that she has telekinetic powers. Repressed by a domineering, ultra-religious mother and tormented by her peers at school, her efforts to fit in lead to a dramatic confrontation during the senior prom.
Pet Sematary: To date, I still haven't finished this book. It scared the crap out of me back in the sixth grade and it still does! I think it was the first book that made me realize that the visions created by words are ten times more frightening than the things you see on television.
Sometimes dead is better....When the Creeds move into a beautiful old house in rural Maine, it all seems too good to be true: physician father, beautiful wife, charming little daughter, adorable infant son -- and now an idyllic home. As a family, they've got it all...right down to the friendly cat.But the nearby woods hide a blood-chilling truth -- more terrifying than death itself...and hideously more powerful.
Sometimes dead is better....When the Creeds move into a beautiful old house in rural Maine, it all seems too good to be true: physician father, beautiful wife, charming little daughter, adorable infant son -- and now an idyllic home. As a family, they've got it all...right down to the friendly cat.But the nearby woods hide a blood-chilling truth -- more terrifying than death itself...and hideously more powerful.
The Vampire Lestat: I fell in love with the flowery phrases used in this novel to describe someone so sinister. I think it was the first time I really looked at the dark beauty in characters without the romantic element.
Once an aristocrat in the heady days of pre-revolutionary France, now Lestat is a rockstar in the demonic, shimmering 1980s. He rushes through the centuries in search of others like him, seeking answers to the mystery of his terrifying existence. His story, the second volume in Anne Rice's best-selling Vampire Chronicles, is mesmerizing, passionate, and thrilling.
Once an aristocrat in the heady days of pre-revolutionary France, now Lestat is a rockstar in the demonic, shimmering 1980s. He rushes through the centuries in search of others like him, seeking answers to the mystery of his terrifying existence. His story, the second volume in Anne Rice's best-selling Vampire Chronicles, is mesmerizing, passionate, and thrilling.
The Witching Hour: One of my favorite books of all time. I think it influenced my use of history in my own work such as the Spiritus Series. My poor copy is falling apart and some of the text has actually worn away at the edges!
On the veranda of a great New Orleans house, now faded, a mute and fragile woman sits rocking. And the witching hour begins ...
Demonstrating once again her gift for spellbinding storytelling and the creation of legend, Anne Rice makes real for us a great dynasty of witches --- a family given to poetry and incest, to murder and philosophy, a family that over the ages is itself haunted by a powerful, dangerous, and seductive being. A hypnotic novel of witchcraft and the occult across four centuries. The Witching Hour could only have been written by the spellbinding bestselling author of The Vampire Chronicles.
On the veranda of a great New Orleans house, now faded, a mute and fragile woman sits rocking. And the witching hour begins ...
Demonstrating once again her gift for spellbinding storytelling and the creation of legend, Anne Rice makes real for us a great dynasty of witches --- a family given to poetry and incest, to murder and philosophy, a family that over the ages is itself haunted by a powerful, dangerous, and seductive being. A hypnotic novel of witchcraft and the occult across four centuries. The Witching Hour could only have been written by the spellbinding bestselling author of The Vampire Chronicles.
Flowers in the Attic: Okay, I'm an eighties child. You couldn't survive adolescence without reading the entire series. That was yet another time I got called out at school for reading inappropriate material. What I loved about this book and the entire series was the long stretching story arc.
It wasn't that she didn't love her children. She did. But there was a fortune at stake--a fortune that would assure their later happiness if she could keep the children a secret from her dying father.
So she and her mother hid her darlings away in an unused attic.
Just for a little while.
But the brutal days swelled into agonizing years. Now Cathy, Chris, and the twins wait in their cramped and helpless world, stirred by adult dreams, adult desires, served a meager sustenance by an angry, superstitious grandmother who knows that the Devil works in dark and devious ways. Sometimes he sends children to do his work--children who--one by one--must be destroyed....
'Way upstairs there are
four secrets hidden.
Blond, beautiful, innocent
struggling to stay alive....
It wasn't that she didn't love her children. She did. But there was a fortune at stake--a fortune that would assure their later happiness if she could keep the children a secret from her dying father.
So she and her mother hid her darlings away in an unused attic.
Just for a little while.
But the brutal days swelled into agonizing years. Now Cathy, Chris, and the twins wait in their cramped and helpless world, stirred by adult dreams, adult desires, served a meager sustenance by an angry, superstitious grandmother who knows that the Devil works in dark and devious ways. Sometimes he sends children to do his work--children who--one by one--must be destroyed....
'Way upstairs there are
four secrets hidden.
Blond, beautiful, innocent
struggling to stay alive....
The Hundred Secret Senses: This is one of those books that at first doesn't make much of an impact, but it dealt with the idea of reincarnation and souls, so judging from my work in the Spiritus Series and in The Soul of the Witch, I have to think it influenced me in some way.
Amy Tan's latest effort unfolds a series of family secrets that questions the connection between fate, beliefs, and hopes, memory and imagination, and the natural gifts of our hundred secret senses. Years after her Chinese half-sister assails her with ghost stories set in the mysterious world of Yin, a young woman finds herself in China, looking for a way to reconcile the ghosts of her past with the dreams of her future.
Amy Tan's latest effort unfolds a series of family secrets that questions the connection between fate, beliefs, and hopes, memory and imagination, and the natural gifts of our hundred secret senses. Years after her Chinese half-sister assails her with ghost stories set in the mysterious world of Yin, a young woman finds herself in China, looking for a way to reconcile the ghosts of her past with the dreams of her future.
The Ghosts: This is an obscure book that few have read, but it was another book that didn't seem like it made much of an impression, but since it dealt with ghosts and messages from the dead, I have to think that there are some remnants of it hanging around in my brain.
When Lucy sat in the attic, she thought she heard the sound of voices calling...
That's when she started to believe the rumors in the village that the old house was haunted. But no ghosts appeared - until the day Lucy and her brother Jamie stood in the garden and watched two pale figures, a girl and a boy, coming toward them.
That was the beginning of a strange and dangerous friendship between Lucy and Jamie and two children who had died a century before.
The ghost children desperately needed their help. But would Lucy and Jamie have the courage to venture into the past - and change the terrible events that had led to murder?
When Lucy sat in the attic, she thought she heard the sound of voices calling...
That's when she started to believe the rumors in the village that the old house was haunted. But no ghosts appeared - until the day Lucy and her brother Jamie stood in the garden and watched two pale figures, a girl and a boy, coming toward them.
That was the beginning of a strange and dangerous friendship between Lucy and Jamie and two children who had died a century before.
The ghost children desperately needed their help. But would Lucy and Jamie have the courage to venture into the past - and change the terrible events that had led to murder?
Harry Potter Books: I don't know how much of an influence the books had on me, but come on...They are just an amazing series!
(From Wikipedia)
Harry Potter is a series of seven fantasy novels written by the British author J. K. Rowling. The series chronicles the adventures of a young wizard, Harry Potter, the titular character, and his friends Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger, all of whom are students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. The main story arcconcerns Harry's quest to overcome the Dark wizard Lord Voldemort, who aims to become immortal, conquer the wizarding world, subjugate non-magical people, and destroy all those who stand in his way, especially Harry Potter.
(From Wikipedia)
Harry Potter is a series of seven fantasy novels written by the British author J. K. Rowling. The series chronicles the adventures of a young wizard, Harry Potter, the titular character, and his friends Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger, all of whom are students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. The main story arcconcerns Harry's quest to overcome the Dark wizard Lord Voldemort, who aims to become immortal, conquer the wizarding world, subjugate non-magical people, and destroy all those who stand in his way, especially Harry Potter.
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